Live data from Hacker News

Blizzard Employees Staged a Walkout to Protest Banned Pro-Hong Kong Gamer

thedailybeast.com

1–10 of 317 posts

Re: Blizzard Employees Staged a Walkout to Protest Banned Pro-Hong Kong Gamer

#2
> “Doing business in China, it’s been easier to ignore the authoritarianism of the government because they were asking us to do things like remove a skeleton [from a game],” he said.

It looks like China learned nothing from the USSR (or from their own Great Leap Forward, for that matter). Escalation is not going to go their way. Hawkish members of the CCP are going to blow the whole thing up.

This is much bigger than Activision-Blizzard and it's clear that Western companies are going to have to pick a side soon. There's a very salient conflict between Wall Street and the Classical Liberal underpinnings of our modern democracies. As it stands right now, this is going to get worse before it gets better. Is anyone worried about the HKD/USD peg falling?

Re: Blizzard Employees Staged a Walkout to Protest Banned Pro-Hong Kong Gamer

#6

I just got some faith back in Blizzard. It was lost.

I don't know why "a small group of Activision Blizzard employees" would do anything to change your "faith" in the company as a whole.

Wake me up when their C-suite staff and board of directors "walk out" or make a meaningful public statement.

Re: Blizzard Employees Staged a Walkout to Protest Banned Pro-Hong Kong Gamer

#7
post #2

> “Doing business in China, it’s been easier to ignore the authoritarianism of the government because they were asking us to do things like remove a skeleton [from a game],” he said. It looks like China learned nothing from the USSR (or from their own Great Leap Forward, for that matter). Escalation is not going to go their way. Hawkish members of the CCP are going to blow the whole thing up. This is much bigger than…

I don't think it's Western companies as much as Western society putting pressure on all companies in general - and that'll bump up really hard against neo-liberalism and especially the libretarian segments of society.

Ideally we'll see political support shifting away from neo-liberalism and toward more pro-democracy ideologies.

Re: Blizzard Employees Staged a Walkout to Protest Banned Pro-Hong Kong Gamer

#8
post #6

I just got some faith back in Blizzard. It was lost.

I don't know why "a small group of Activision Blizzard employees" would do anything to change your "faith" in the company as a whole. Wake me up when their C-suite staff and board of directors "walk out" or make a meaningful public statement.

It's a bit late for any faith there - the PR calculation has swung and the fiscally responsible thing is to back off this move - but as soon as the spotlight is gone all the math will go back in favor of appeasing China.

Re: Blizzard Employees Staged a Walkout to Protest Banned Pro-Hong Kong Gamer

#9
post #2

> “Doing business in China, it’s been easier to ignore the authoritarianism of the government because they were asking us to do things like remove a skeleton [from a game],” he said. It looks like China learned nothing from the USSR (or from their own Great Leap Forward, for that matter). Escalation is not going to go their way. Hawkish members of the CCP are going to blow the whole thing up. This is much bigger than…

Wall Street has nothing to do with it.

https://www.pcgamer.com/every-game-company-that-tencent-has-...

Re: Blizzard Employees Staged a Walkout to Protest Banned Pro-Hong Kong Gamer

#10
By far the most egregious example of western firms working with China are management consulting companies like McKinsey that work directly with governments on expensive contracts, including of course China.

I mean, in those cases they are often writing the playbook for the government when it comes to implementing certain policies. Crazy that is even legal for a western firm.

Post reply on HN